US push-polling by our friends the French

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Apparently the US media are not the only ones interested in manipulating US public opinion by biased polls. The French are doing it, too! In an article called "When France Polls America..." John Rosenthal reports that the lowest scores for President Bush are consistently found by the "AP—Ipsos" poll. Who is Ipsos? It just happens to be Jacques Chirac's favorite pollster.

There's now a mounting pile of evidence for deliberate Anti—US media manipulation by France. This is just another layer of the pile.

The US may not need to try for regime change in Paris. French voters have a say.

Clarice Feldman adds:

Next time you see an AP—IPSOS poll, you might consider that it is French owned, well—aligned with the French elites, and has the kind of skewed results its methodology dictates:

French public opinion firms have a long tradition of seemingly minimizing or exaggerating trends —— if not outright contriving them —— to suit the interests of their "prince" or, more generally, of the French political elites. This regularly leads to great "surprises" when votes are actually held: such as, for instance, the April 2002 "shock" that saw Jean—Marie Le Pen of the National Front taking second place in the first round of the French presidential elections in front of Socialist candidate Lionel Jospin. Ipsos arguably has the worst track record of them all and, unlike the more discreet Truchot, Lech has made something of a name for himself in France by regularly putting his foot in his mouth before important votes. In the run—up to the April 2002 ballot, Ipsos polling and Lech had been building up Trotskyist candidate Arlette Laguiller as the potential "third man" in the presidential contest. On the eve of the vote, Lech predicted that Le Pen would receive 13 percent of the vote and confidently asserted that "if there's one political party whose score we can predict days before the election without worrying about making a mistake, it's the National Front". Le Pen finished with 17 percent and Ipsos's "third man", the politically non—threatening Laguiller, finished well back in the pack with less than 6 percent.

Even though the last Ipsos survey before the May 29 French referendum on the EU "constitution" hit the mark on the 55 to 45 percent official result, Ipsos polling in the run up to the referendum provided still further confirmation of its seeming penchant for accommodating the designs of the French elites: which in this case clearly involved pulling for a "yes" vote. Thus, on May 2, less than a month before the referendum and after opinion polls had already been showing the "no" vote steadily ahead for several weeks, Ipsos pulled a veritable rabbit out of the hat and announced that the "yes" had suddenly recaptured the lead —— and by a comfortable six—point margin no less! As this startling news evidently did not manage to convince the majority of the French that they did, after all, support the EU "constitution" that they were against, Ipsos, rather than risk embarrassment, quickly went back to reporting a majority for the "no".

It should be noted that Ipsos risks no embarrassment in publishing its recent figures on George Bush, since the latter will not be running in any further elections. A closer look at Ipsos polling data, however, gives considerable cause to pause regarding the company's methods. Thus, for example, for it latest poll —— the one allegedly showing that "most" Americans consider George Bush dishonest —— Ipsos somehow managed massively to oversample Democratic voters. As the raw data reveal, fully 51 percent of the Ipsos respondents identified themselves as Democrats as compared to only 40 percent who identified themselves as Republicans.

Mickey Kaus has coined the phrase "hamburger helper" polls to describe the use of phony polls designed to allow the media to run as news their editorial opinions. And for that purpose AP IPSOS seems tailor made.

Apparently the US media are not the only ones interested in manipulating US public opinion by biased polls. The French are doing it, too! In an article called "When France Polls America..." John Rosenthal reports that the lowest scores for President Bush are consistently found by the "AP—Ipsos" poll. Who is Ipsos? It just happens to be Jacques Chirac's favorite pollster.

There's now a mounting pile of evidence for deliberate Anti—US media manipulation by France. This is just another layer of the pile.

The US may not need to try for regime change in Paris. French voters have a say.

Clarice Feldman adds:

Next time you see an AP—IPSOS poll, you might consider that it is French owned, well—aligned with the French elites, and has the kind of skewed results its methodology dictates:

French public opinion firms have a long tradition of seemingly minimizing or exaggerating trends —— if not outright contriving them —— to suit the interests of their "prince" or, more generally, of the French political elites. This regularly leads to great "surprises" when votes are actually held: such as, for instance, the April 2002 "shock" that saw Jean—Marie Le Pen of the National Front taking second place in the first round of the French presidential elections in front of Socialist candidate Lionel Jospin. Ipsos arguably has the worst track record of them all and, unlike the more discreet Truchot, Lech has made something of a name for himself in France by regularly putting his foot in his mouth before important votes. In the run—up to the April 2002 ballot, Ipsos polling and Lech had been building up Trotskyist candidate Arlette Laguiller as the potential "third man" in the presidential contest. On the eve of the vote, Lech predicted that Le Pen would receive 13 percent of the vote and confidently asserted that "if there's one political party whose score we can predict days before the election without worrying about making a mistake, it's the National Front". Le Pen finished with 17 percent and Ipsos's "third man", the politically non—threatening Laguiller, finished well back in the pack with less than 6 percent.

Even though the last Ipsos survey before the May 29 French referendum on the EU "constitution" hit the mark on the 55 to 45 percent official result, Ipsos polling in the run up to the referendum provided still further confirmation of its seeming penchant for accommodating the designs of the French elites: which in this case clearly involved pulling for a "yes" vote. Thus, on May 2, less than a month before the referendum and after opinion polls had already been showing the "no" vote steadily ahead for several weeks, Ipsos pulled a veritable rabbit out of the hat and announced that the "yes" had suddenly recaptured the lead —— and by a comfortable six—point margin no less! As this startling news evidently did not manage to convince the majority of the French that they did, after all, support the EU "constitution" that they were against, Ipsos, rather than risk embarrassment, quickly went back to reporting a majority for the "no".

It should be noted that Ipsos risks no embarrassment in publishing its recent figures on George Bush, since the latter will not be running in any further elections. A closer look at Ipsos polling data, however, gives considerable cause to pause regarding the company's methods. Thus, for example, for it latest poll —— the one allegedly showing that "most" Americans consider George Bush dishonest —— Ipsos somehow managed massively to oversample Democratic voters. As the raw data reveal, fully 51 percent of the Ipsos respondents identified themselves as Democrats as compared to only 40 percent who identified themselves as Republicans.

Mickey Kaus has coined the phrase "hamburger helper" polls to describe the use of phony polls designed to allow the media to run as news their editorial opinions. And for that purpose AP IPSOS seems tailor made.